So I just came back from Shanghai Disney Resort, yes be jealous haters!

First of all, I would like to say a huge thank you to all the cast members and everyone working behind the scene. When I was inside of the park today, I was the one saying “Thank you Cast Member Chris and have a magical day” hundreds of times and make everybody happy.

The weather today was not really nice, It was rainy and extremely humid. But Disney handeled the bad weather pretty well.

First thing I can clearly tell about this park is that it is engineered to hold huge crowd. Walkways are massive and there are small paths separated by trees in main walkways so that people can still move around during parade. The park seems well prepared for the grand opening as all the cast members seem to be very confident about their roles in the park while there are still some of them not really used to being called “Cast Member” and called themselves staff because Chinese society is so used to the word “Staff” and “waiter”. I think the opening team did an excellent job.

Guests wise, since it is opening day, there were a lot of American and Japanese Disney fans. I almost had a Tokyo Disney flash back because I was camping outside of the park since 7:00 am and everybody around me is either Japanese or American. Chinese guests are significantly better behaved then those I saw at say Wanda and Happy Valley because whoever try to get opening day tickets is a fan of the Disney culture to each of their own levels. Aside from a really rude guest that almost got into fist fight with a cast member when he was trying to walk through the restricted area during firework, it is generally more acceptable than I expected.

Ride wise, I am leaving full reviews till later because I will be leaving for the park again in 2 hours (yes, no sleep between two Disney park days and camping outside 3 hours earlier). But let me just say I would take out Journey and Tower of Terror at Tokyo Disney Sea in exchange of something like Pirates at Shanghai Disney. I am more shocked than impressed. And Soarin’s new movie is a lot better than the old one, especially the new scents.

Operation wise, certain rides are going much slower than how Disney should be like, such as 7DMT and the seriously pointless canoe ride. But Soarin’, Tron and Pirates are running as fast as possible.

Please keep in mind that I don’t think this park is English friendly enough. There is no English on Fast Pass tickets, the subtitles for the pre-shows most rides are pretty hard to see and there is no English subtitles during shows. I’ve seen quite a lot of confused international guests. Cast members all speak enough English for their positions but sometimes very heavy accent might get in the way a bit.

Overall, Shanghai Disney feels like somewhere in between HongKong’s Disney Discount Edition and Tokyo’s Disney Deluxe Edition. Some of the rides are truly incredible but there are definitely some things to improve on as of now. I personally think for grand opening, it is already as good as it can be. It will be much better when the park gets to warm up a little bit more.

Shout out to the guy born in Lafayette, IN sitting next to me on Soarin’!

Subway to Disney!

This photo was taken on the first train to Disney resort. But later I found out only 3 of us were not cast members. phew!

Shanghai Disneyland Resort Station!

Here I am outside of the security check area. The group in front of me is from Tokyo and they've been camping out since 2:00am!

4TH GUEST OF Shanghai Disneyland! Thank you cast members for taking this picture!

Look at all those people that's gonna be behind me!

First stop! Actually second stop. I ran to 7DMT for a 5 minutes stop and finished that thing because Pirates eats people like 3 B&M combined.

Park is still empty as of now.

Pirates station. The queue line is ridiculously long but one of the most detailed I've seen, especially the part closer to the loading station.

Theming!

The mountain with the adventure trail that does not allow any loose articles including phones and hats.

Roaring Rapids is opened but without single rider line so I'm leaving it for tomorrow.

Tomorrowland!

Nice sign with Jet Pack back there.

By the way, the Soarin' FP is the first official fast pass of Shanghai Disneyland. I almost wanted to keep it but I still remember how painfully slow the line was at EPCOT.

Yes they have Corn Dog, now please bring Dole Whip here!

Back to Adventure Isle.

Soarin's queue is outside of the waiting area now.

Bye baby :(

OK While EPCOT's Soarin' queue line has games and DCA's Soarin's queue has a photo of Amelia Earhart (BOILER UP!!), I think this is the best queue line of them all.

So much nicer than metal boxes!

New video without Patrick Warburton.

Detail

This Kimchi and roast beef wrap tastes so good!

Yea still no

Most pointless Disney ride in the history

Yeah feels like I need a bottle of those after that ride.

Pirates is over there

Walkway designed to deal with huge parade crowd.

Alice! This maze has more than just hidden Mickeys!

This is the way to the new Toy Story expansion behind Tomorrowland. They already started construction.

Tomorrowland from another direction

TRON!!!

Such a beauty!

Don't even argue with me, this is the best roller coaster station.

It looks simple but the lightings are changing all the time!

Yes!

Time for Buzz!

I GOT LEVEL 6! I usually suck at shooting dark rides but not this time!

Awesome TR! I'm surprised that the park wasn't more packed for opening day... but perhaps the crowds were spread out due to the size. The wait time for Soarin' was still long, but it seems like some in the press were expecting mass hysteria on opening day - seemed very reasonable.

Any word on the AA for Roaring Rapids? Waiting patiently for video to see if it's fixed, and if it's as cool as the concept art made it out to be...

Yin, dude, I like you. You're a good guy. But I gotta be honest with you here, see, I can't respect you now. Not because you got to Shanghai Disney, no, that's not the reason. The reason is because you said you'd happily rip out Journey AND Tower at Tokyo to replace it with Pirates AKA Spider-Man On Water.

Now, nothing against this Pirates as I'm sure it's great, but c'mon, really? Disney's best ever ride (Journey) and (probably) second best ever ride (Tower) in exchange for that? Naw, dude, naw. You crazy.

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